


The Way of the Warrior

by Asubler87



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-12-03 21:15:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,728
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11540571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Asubler87/pseuds/Asubler87
Summary: After receiving a book from a mysterious old woman, Rose and the Doctor find themselves reliving a memory from the Doctor's past. With the help from previous companions and the original Doctor, Rose and her Doctor work together to make sure that everything goes exactly the same way, as it did before.





	The Way of the Warrior

The outdoor market, on the planet Butik, was overflowing with off-world shoppers, who were taking advantage of the warm, sunny day. The addition of a TARDIS, to the organized chaos of Butik, was simply overlooked by the crowds of customers, just like the Doctor wanted. It was supposed to be a quick stop, five to ten minutes tops, but when Rose found out the entire planet was just one big shopping mall, the Doctor realized that this quick trip might take a little longer than he had planned.

  
The Doctor and Rose decided that it made more sense to split up and meet back at the TARDIS within the hour, allowing the Doctor to purchase the things he needed without having to keep an eye on his jeopardy friendly companion. He just hoped she would show up sometime before dark. As the Doctor left to find the TARDIS parts that he desired, Rose began a mission of her own – finding gifts for her mum and Mickey.

  
Rose began aimlessly walking up and down the aisles, stopping occasionally at the booths that caught her attention. Rose came to the end of one of the aisles when she noticed a booth that was selling an assortment of books. While the book stand looked like it had seen better days, it still intrigued Rose enough to go and take a look. She thought she could perhaps buy the Doctor a book that he could add to the TARDIS’s library. She knew finding a book the Doctor didn’t already have would probably be impossible, but she still wanted to try.

  
Rose ran her fingers along the spines of the books that were in the quaint little book stand. She felt sorry for the proprietor of the stand because it was quite obvious that it had been awhile since a customer had even looked at any of the books for sale. Rose tried to discreetly wipe the dust from the books onto her jeans.

  
“Can I help you, miss?”

  
Startled, Rose turned around to find an old woman standing behind her. The old woman had a kind face, but Rose had an uneasy feeling about the “creature” that stood in front of her. To Rose, she looked to be human, but Rose had learned, quite quickly, that many species in the universe could be mistaken as humans. The Doctor, for example, looked human, but after this past Christmas, Rose realized he clearly was not human. Humans don’t go around changing their faces. Well… most humans. Suddenly realizing that the old woman had asked her a question, Rose quickly answered.

  
“Um…yes. I want to buy a book, for a friend, but I have no idea where to begin.” Rose let out a small chuckle as she gestured towards the shelves of books behind her.

  
“Is this book for a boyfriend?” asked the old woman.

  
“No!” Rose didn’t mean for her answer to sound rude, but she felt the need to straighten the old woman out, immediately. “Sorry,” apologized Rose, “I didn’t mean to yell. No, the person I am buying it for is simply just a mate. A mate that I happen to travel with.”

  
With a quick nod and smile, the old woman turned her back to Rose and started to walk to the other side of the stand. Rose took the old woman’s nod as a simple direction to follow her. She followed the old woman over to a stack of books that she hadn’t seen before. Actually, Rose could have sworn that stack of books had not been there when she arrived. She watched as the woman ran her finger up and down the stack until she noticed a particular book in the center or the stack. With one quick jerk, the book dislodged itself from the stack without causing any of the other books to fall. The old woman turned towards Rose and offered her the book.

  
“Thank you,” said Rose, taking the used book from the woman’s hand. She looked down at the old, worn leather book. Rose’s fingers trailed over the faded gold writing, which once revealed the name of the book, a long time ago. Rose raised her head to seek out the old woman, who had walked away the second she handed over the book, hoping she could tell her more about the book, like what it was about. Rose found the old woman standing behind a make-shift counter, which looked more like a tiki bar than a place one would conduct business transactions.

  
“How would you like to pay for the book?” The old woman stood there, staring at Rose for an answer. She extended her hand towards Rose, silently requesting for her to hand over the book.

  
Rose looked down at the book in her hand, her eyes roaming over the cover. She still wanted to know what the book was about before she bought it for the Doctor, but the old woman's gaze was making her uncomfortable, so she simply handed over the book without saying a word.

  
“He will like the book.”

  
Rose was caught off guard by the woman speaking to her and had to ask her to repeat what she had just said.

  
“I said, ‘He will like the book’.”

  
“Oh, thanks, I’m sure he will.”

  
Rose gave the old woman a polite smile and watched as she returned to taking care of her purchase. After being informed of how much was owed, Rose handed over the credit stick, the Doctor had given her when they arrived, and waited for the book to be placed in a bag. Rose watched as the old woman, carefully, wrapped the book in white tissue paper and placed it in a colorful bag. Giving the woman a quick nod, along with a smile, Rose took the small bag and turned to leave the small book stand. However, the old woman’s voice stopped Rose in her tracks.

  
“It’s a shame you couldn’t find a book for yourself. I’m sure if you would give me a few minutes I could find one for you.”

  
“Oh, well that’s very kind of you,” acknowledged Rose, “but I am not much of a reader. Plus we have quite a few books on our ship that I have not had the opportunity to read yet.”

  
“Well, how about this?” Rose watched the woman pull out a small, blue book from underneath the counter and held it for Rose to see.

  
“What’s that?” inquired Rose.

  
“Well, you said that you and your friend travel quite a bit, so why not write about your travels…in this book.” The old woman tapped on the book for emphasis.

  
Rose returned to the counter, placed her bag on top, and gently picked up the book that was placed in front of her. The cover of the book was made from old, worn, TARDIS blue leather and Rose noticed, upon further observation, that there were overlapping circles imprinted into the leather, resembling the Doctor’s native language.

  
“It was very kind of you to show me this and I do appreciate it, but the amount of traveling I do doesn’t really leave that much time for anything else.” Rose placed the book back on the counter.

  
“Rose!”

  
Upon hearing her name, Rose turned to see the Doctor walking towards her. She could see that he had found what he was looking for, but had a suspicious feeling that he bought a few extra things that he didn’t need, based on the number of shopping bags he currently had in his hands.

  
“Well, it looks like you found everything you were looking for and then some,”

  
The Doctor looked at the bags in his hands and returned his gaze back to Rose.

  
“Yeah, I was able to find everything I needed and a few extra things. Oh, and this bag is just bananas.” The Doctor held up the largest of the three bags for Rose to look inside. “So what are you doing here?”

  
“Oh! I was just shopping,” replied Rose.

  
“I kind of figured that. What did you buy?”

  
“Um,” Rose reached behind her and grabbed her purchase off of the counter, “just a few trinkets for Mum and Mickey.” Rose didn’t like lying to the Doctor, honestly she didn’t even know why she was lying to him, but she wanted to keep her gift for him a secret.

  
“Well, that was nice of you.”

  
“Yeah, well I try.”  
“So, who did you buy that from?” asked the Doctor.

  
“Uh, from…” Rose turned around, in order to jester to the woman behind her, but upon turning around, Rose was surprised to find no one standing behind the counter. She looked around the little book stand, assuming that she had left the counter to rearrange books or help another customer, but she simply disappeared. Turning back to the Doctor, she finished what she was saying, “There was an old woman standing here a few minutes ago. You must have seen her when you were walking towards me.”

  
“Rose, there was no one behind you when I walked up.”

  
Rose quickly turned around again, in search of the woman, but like the first time, she was nowhere to be seen. Rose knew she wasn’t crazy, she just spent the last five minutes having a conversation with someone about purchasing the Doctor a book. The old woman even offered her a small journal, so she could write about the adventures she went on with the Doctor.

  
“That’s odd,” whispered Rose.

  
“What?” inquired the Doctor.

  
“Nothing! Nothing. I must have been mistaken.” Rose continued to look around the little book stand, however there was still no one there other than her and the Doctor.

  
“Rose.”

  
“Hmm?”

  
Rose brought her eyes back to the Doctor who was standing in front of her with his hand extended and fingers wiggling. She linked her fingers with the Doctor’s and allowed him to lead her in the direction of the TARDIS, but she couldn’t help looking back at the book stand one last time. She knew she wasn’t crazy. The old woman had been real, but she knew it was a waste of time to worry about it. In a few minutes, she and the Doctor would be in the Vortex and Butik, along with the woman, would be just become a memory.


End file.
